Bungacast

UNLOCKED: /351/ Eating the Left’s Lunch? ft. Cecilia Lero & Tamás Gerőcs

On the radical right in the global periphery.

 

[This was originally a Patreon Exclusive]

 

Erdogan, Modi, Orban, Bolsonaro, Duterte. Though the latter two are gone, the first three are still going strong, in government for a decade or more. What unites these figures? They’re all right wing and authoritarian, but also popular and anti-establishment.

 

How similar are these politicians to their analogues in the core of global capitalism? Might they even be seen to be forerunners of developments in the rich world? And to what extent are they able to resolve the crises of the end of the end of history?

 

In this episode, we talk to two of the editors of a new book, The Radical Right: Politics of Hate on the Margins of Global Capital.

 

Previous episodes on this theme:

• Turkey /339/ Erdogone? People vs Nation in Turkey ft. Alp Kayserilioglu
• Brazil: /299/ Micropower & Transcendence in Brazil (Bungazão 2022) ft. Miguel Lago
• Brazil: /292/ Bungazão 2022: Unrealistic Pragmatism, ft. Unbridled Possibility Collective
• India: /198/ Universal India ft. Achin Vanaik
• Hungary: /33/ Hungary's Illiberal Democracy ft. Tamas Gerocs
• Philippines: /52/ Duterte's Despotism ft. Nicole Curato

Excerpt: /351/ Eating the Left’s Lunch? ft. Cecilia Lero & Tamás Gerőcs

On the radical right in the global periphery.

 

[Patreon Exclusive]

 

Erdogan, Modi, Orban, Bolsonaro, Duterte. Though the latter two are gone, the first three are still going strong, in government for a decade or more. What unites these figures? They’re all right wing and authoritarian, but also popular and anti-establishment.

 

How similar are these politicians to their analogues in the core of global capitalism? Might they even be seen to be forerunners of developments in the rich world? And to what extent are they able to resolve the crises of the end of the end of history?

 

In this episode, we talk to two of the editors of a new book, The Radical Right: Politics of Hate on the Margins of Global Capital.

 

Previous episodes on the theme:

• Turkey /339/ Erdogone? People vs Nation in Turkey ft. Alp Kayserilioglu
• Brazil: /299/ Micropower & Transcendence in Brazil (Bungazão 2022) ft. Miguel Lago
• Brazil: /292/ Bungazão 2022: Unrealistic Pragmatism, ft. Unbridled Possibility Collective
• India: /198/ Universal India ft. Achin Vanaik
• Hungary: /33/ Hungary's Illiberal Democracy ft. Tamas Gerocs
• Philippines: /52/ Duterte's Despotism ft. Nicole Curato

/299/ Micropower & Transcendence in Brazil (Bungazão 2022) ft. Miguel Lago

On reclaiming populism.

 

With only a couple of days to go until the decisive runoff between Lula and Bolsonaro, we continue our Bungazão 2022 series by talking to to political scientist Miguel Lago about how Lula and Bolsonaro both construct a Brazilian people. Lula does so broadly on class lines, while Bolsonaro's construction is a moral one: "good citizens" and those to be excluded. 

 

Why is populism the right way to analyse the election, and how might Lula re-embody Brazil's greatest populist leader, Getúlio Vargas? We discuss how Bolsonarismo works on the basis of 'micropower' – that is, it appeals to those who hold power over others in any walk of life.

 

And we conclude by looking at Bolsonaro's combination of transcendence and transgression, and how it has re-politicised Brazilian society. Why is this recipe proving more successful than the transactional politics of old?

 

Readings:

• Batalhadores do Brasil, Miguel Lago, piauí (in Portuguese)
• The self-help guru who conquered Brazil, Alex Hochuli, UnHerd
• What Lula's Comeback Means, Alex Hochuli, Compact
• Do que falamos quando falamos de populismo, Miguel Lago & Tomás Zicman de Barros, Companhia das Letras (in Portuguese)
• Linguagem da destruição, Miguel Lago et al., Companhia de Letras (in Portuguese)

Listenings:

• On anti-corruption: /297/ Bungazão 2022 (Clean & Godly) ft. Benjamin Fogel (on anti-corruption)
• On the war of all against all: /292/ Bungazão 2022: Unrealistic Pragmatism, ft. Unbridled Possibility Collective
• On the role of the military: /284/ Bungazão 2022 ft. Alcysio Canette

/297/ Bungazão 2022 (Clean & Godly) ft. Benjamin Fogel

On corruption & anti-corruption.

When Bolsonaro won in 2018, he rode a wave of anti-corruption sentiment. Now he's doled out billions in pork via a secret budget, but this doesn't seem to bother his supporters. What happened?

Benjamin Fogel, who studies the history of corruption in Brazil, comes on to discuss how a moralistic account of corruption has fortified the far right. How has corruption been used as a political weapon in the past, and how has it shifted from right to left and back again?

How are scandals made rather than born? And what would an anti-corruption politics that is emancipatory look like – rather than the predominant technocratic or moralistic form today?

Readings:

• Against Anti-Corruption, Benjamin Fogel, Jacobin
• From Anti-Politics to Authoritarian Restoration in Brazil, Alex Hochuli, Jacobin

 

/292/ Bungazão 2022: Unrealistic Pragmatism, ft. Unbridled Possibility Collective

On Brazil's containment of the crisis.

We talk to members of the Unbridled Possibility Collective (Fabio Luis B. Santos | Thais Pavez | Daniel Cunha) about their intervention, trying to look beyond this week's election in Brazil.

What does establishment support for Lula this time round represent? Is Lula guilty of "unrealistic pragmatism"? How will Brazil react to a potential coup attempt by Bolsonaro? 

And we look at the deeper social and structural context: what are the features of the Brazilian "war of all against all"? How does Bolsonaro accelerate these tendencies?

We conclude by looking at the possibility of a new 'Pink Wave' in Latin America and examining the state of the Brazilian left. 

Readings:

• After the Election: a Contribution to the Debate, Unbridled Possibility Collective, Damage
• /189/ Pink Tide Paradoxes ft. Fabio Luis
• Brazil's Arrested Development, Alex Hochuli, Jacobin
• Policing Bolsonaro's Brazil, Alex Hochuli, Verso

 

/286/ What Was Communism? ft. Branko Milanovic

On Communism's historic role.

 

We talk to renowned Serbian-American economist Branko Milanovic about growing up in Yugoslavia and how, in much of the world, History never ended. We then dedicate much of the episode to discussing Branko's claim that communism was essentially an engine of economic convergence, allowing developing countries to haul themselves into the industrial age.

 

We also talk about Branko's work on inequality and why growth still matters. 

 

Readings:

• Capitalism, Alone, Branko Milanovic, Harvard UP
• The Aloofness of Pax Sinica, Branko Milanovic, Global Policy Journal

/284/ Bungazão 2022 ft. Alcysio Canette

On Brazil's elections and the military.

 

A month away from the first round showdown between former president Lula and current president Jair Bolsonaro, lawyer, podcaster and communist Alcysio Canette joins us to look at the features that have shaped the past years.

 

How did Bolsonaro's response to the Covid pandemic – denialism, essentially – tarnish his image? What role is the military playing in Brazilian politics and what is its history of political interference since the 1964-85 dictatorship?

 

Part two available at: patreon.com/posts/71560313

 

Readings:

• Will Bolsonaro Be Held Responsible for Brazil’s COVID-19 Disaster?, Alcysio Canette, Jacobin
• Cálice podcast, Atabaque Produções (in Portuguese)
• Pro-Bolsonaro Protests Were Supposed to Show His Strength. Instead, They Showed His Weakness, Alex Hochuli, Jacobin (on last year's 7 September protests)
• From Anti-Politics to Authoritarian Restoration in Brazil, Alex Hochuli, Jacobin

/228/ Three Articles: Popular Backlash in Chile, India, Europe

On people power on three continents.

We discuss Chile's landmark elections, the first after the uprising of 2019-20, which see a face-off between left and far-right; Modi's repeal of controversial laws that provoked a huge mobilisation of farmers in India last year; and protests and riots against new lockdowns and vaccine mandates across Europe.

Articles:

• Has the Backlash to Progressivism Come to Chile?, Lili Loofbourow, Slate
• In Rare Show of Weakness, Modi Bows to India’s Farmers, Various, NYT
• Violence in Belgium and Netherlands as Covid protests erupt across Europe, Jon Henley, The Guardian

Other relevant episodes

• /93/ Hot Chile and Other Neoliberal Failures ft. Pablo Pryluka
• /198/ Universal India ft. Achin Vanaik

 

/200/ The World In One Country ft. Many Guests

On world history, 1900-2020.

For our 200th episode special, we pose the question: "If you had to study the history of only one country from 1900-2020, and thereby understand the history of the whole world, which would you pick?"

We invited 10 contributors to each pitch one country, whose particularities capture the universal sweep of world history from the start of the 20th century till now.

Vote for which you think is best, and we'll have the top 3 back on to discuss in more depth: Link to voting page

Running order:

• (18:20) Germany - Dominik Leusder
• (23:02) Greece - Jonas Kyratzes
• (27:57) India - David Adler
• (33:46) Indonesia - Vincent Bevins
• (38:25) Iraq - Liam Meissner
• (44:03) Italy - David Broder
• (49:19) Mexico - Roger Lancaster
• (54:01) Taiwan - Nic Johnson
• (59:44) Turkey - Arash Azizi
• (01:04:32) Yugoslavia - Lily Lynch

Buy our book! Links to retailers

Come to our London book launch! Event link

/189/ Pink Tide Paradoxes ft. Fabio Luis

On Latin America's progressive wave and its discontents.

A new book on Latin America argues that 'pink tide' governments tried to treat the symptoms of neoliberal capitalism while allowing the underlying situation to worse. We talk to the author, Fabio Luis, about cases across the region, including the election in Ecuador and Venezuela's disaster, to Bolivia's coup and Argentina's "path of least resistance". How important is regional integration and what does an alternative socialist vision entail? And we ponder a sad question: is the dream of development and modernisation over? 

Readings:

• Power and Impotence: A History of South America Under Progressivism (1998-2016), Fabio Luis Barbosa dos Santos, Haymarket
• /93/ Hot Chile and Other Neoliberal Failures ft. Pablo Pryluka Bungacast

/187/ The Huge Package State ft. Anton Jäger

On cash welfarism and state investment. Plus regionalism in Belgium & the UK.

Anton Jäger is back on the pod to discuss the emerging 'transfer state'. We examine Biden's massive trillion-dollar spending plans and ask if this means we're leaving neoliberalism. What are the limitations to the 'cashification of welfare'? Also comparisons with cash transfers or lack thereof in the UK, Brazil and Belgium.

Plus Anton talks us through recent Belgian history and why its immobilism and bureaucracy has actually prevented a full-on neoliberal assault. 

[Part 2 available at patreon.com/bungacast]

Readings:

• “Welfare without the welfare state”: the death of the postwar welfarist consensus, Anton Jäger & Daniel Zamora, New Statesman
• Joe Biden Is a Transformational President, David Brooks, NYT

/165/ Black Spartacus ft. Sudhir Hazareesingh

CLR James’s electrifying 1938 history of the 1791-1804 Haitian Revolution, The Black Jacobins, has long been a staple of many radicals’ libraries. But we now know a lot more about the life of the Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint L’Ouverture. How does this new knowledge impact our understanding of the Haitian Revolution, and on revolution in general? Sudhir Hazeeresingh, the author of a gripping new biography based on new archival research, ‘Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint L’Ouverture, talks with us about about revolutionary leadership and Atlantic history.  

Reading:

• Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint L’Ouverture
• ‘You never know when it is going to explode’, interview with CLR James, Marxist Internet Archive

/147/ The Past Doesn't Go Away ft. Benjamin Moser

On modernism and its end. 

We're joined by 2020 Pulitzer Prize winner Benjamin Moser to discuss the tensions between hating your national culture and wanting to leave it behind, and the effacement of national culture by postmodern homogenisation.

We talk about his biography of Susan Sontag, plus a range of other questions: Brazil, USA, literature, architecture, sex, imperialism, Freud, the image and representation, and contemporary wokeness.

Moser's Books:

• Sontag: Her Life and Work
• Autoimperialismo
• Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector

Excerpt: /140/ Three Articles: Right-Populism

The full episode is for patrons only. Sign up at patreon.com/bungacast

In this latest Three Articles, we discuss the durability or otherwise of right-populism in the UK, US and Brazil.

Reading:

• Conservatives’ grip on ‘red wall’ holding firm, Sebastian Payne, FT
• Lawmakers ‘Alarmed’ by Reports U.S. Envoy Told Brazil It Could Help Re-elect Trump, Ernesto Londoño, Manuela Andreoni and Letícia Casado, NYT
• “Imagine the damage a president could cause”: What would happen if Trump refused defeat?, Emily Tamkin, New Statesman

/121/ Those Murdering Bastards ft. Vincent Bevins

On The Jakarta Method.

We're joined by Vincent Bevins to discuss his new book on the 1965-66 mass killings in Indonesia, Cold War anti-communism, and the destruction it wrought around the world. The mid-60s proved pivotal, with US-backed coups in Indonesia and Brazil setting the template. What was their effect on the Left worldwide? How did it alter developmental trajectories across the Third World? What lessons can we take from these historical experiences?

Running Order:

• Indonesia - (10:43)
• Brazil & application of Jakarta Method - (36:14)
• Themes of anticommunism - (43:55)
• Global consequences - (53:03)
• Anticommunism today - (01:14:39)
• Bonus stuff - (1:21:18)

Reading:
The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World